THE OTHERS
by David Mowat
Directed by Peter Whelan
Cast:
Bruce Alexander, Caroline Crumley, Carla Field, Graham Howard, Lawrence Irvin, Mary Jones, Ken Ratcliffe, Geoff Todd
THE AUTHOR
Questopics, June 1970
Born in Cairo in 1943, David Mowat was a British playwright, director and composer. By 1971 he had already had twelve plays performed, eight of them professionally, and five published by Calder and Boyars.
The Questors played an important part in his early career, sponsoring him for an Arts Council New Drama Bursary in 1970 and presenting three of his plays in successive New Plays Festivals: The Others (1970), John (1971) and My Relationship with Jayne (1973).
His work frequently explored characters confronting primitive instincts and unsettling forces beneath apparently ordinary behaviour. The Questors later staged The Midnight Sun in 1983 and The Almas in 1989. Mowat also worked in television and film and continued writing for the theatre until his death in 2004.
THE PLAY
The Others is very much a play written for us at Questors. The action might be taking place at a normal reasonably comfortable family home in Ealing. A father sits with his wife, son and daughter talking about the plans they might have for the coming week-end. Suddenly it changes. And what produces that change? ...... what makes the father accuse and interrogate his family? ...... why does he bring in 'The Others' to complete the interrogation? ..... you will need to find out for yourself. Like the plot of a good detective story it can't be given away in advance. Tremendous moments of drama contrast with situations bordering on farce. And through the plot runs the theme of the old or middle-aged confronting the young that is so much a preoccupation of the author and his generation—if not all of us.
PRODUCTION PHOTOS
David Mowat's disturbing family drama received a respectful but qualified response from all three reviewers. Critics admired its theatrical ambition, its powerful first half and its uncompromising examination of violence, guilt and family relationships. Frank Cox in Plays and Players found it an oddly haunting work whose emotional intensity was sustained by strong writing and performances, while The Stage praised its dramatic climaxes despite regretting that the symbolic "Others" were never satisfactorily explained. Amateur Stage likewise admired Mowat's ambition but felt the accumulation of unanswered questions and unexplained symbolism weakened the play's overall impact. The consensus was that an imaginative and powerful concept was not entirely matched by its dramatic resolution.
Amateur Stage
Plays and Players
The Stage and Television Today